An Amish Family Reunion Read Online Free PDF

didn’t even hear coming.” Joanna Byler surveyed the room from the doorway—overflowing bowls of ripe fruit, balls of rising dough under dampened towels, trays of cooling piecrusts, and racks of finished pies, while a thin cloud of flour hung in the warm air.
    “Everything is right as rain,” answered Leah with a grin. “Although, I daresay, lunch will have to be served on the porch. I can’t really set the table on baking day.”
    “No porch. It’s perfect weather for the picnic table. I’ll load bread, meat, and cheese into a hamper and make sandwiches outside. You grab jars of pickled veggies, plates, forks, and cups. And don’t forget the pitcher of iced tea.”
    Sandwiches were ready to eat under the shady oak just as Jonah and his
grossdawdi
headed to the old pump house. They usually washed up there at midday to avoid disrupting either woman’s work. Leah pulled her full-length apron over her head and patiently waited for her husband. Jonah. Even after four years of marriage, she still felt that ripple of excitement when she saw him coming her way.
    God had shone His grace on her the day she chose
this
particular cheese maker to buy some baking supplies from. Most Old Order dairy farmers in Holmes County sold their milk to one of the large cheese houses, but Jonah had installed enough automatic milking and refrigeration equipment, run by diesel-powered generators, so that his mother could culture several varieties of specialty cheeses right here. Jonah and his mother had moved back from Wisconsin to help her parents run the farm. Milking cows, breeding heifers, and raising enough crops to feed livestock during the winter had become too much for
grossdawdi
. But it wasn’t too much for Jonah, a tall man with big hands and an even larger heart. Strong and rugged, but soft-spoken, he had the prettiest blue eyes this side of the Pacific Ocean. Not that Leah had even seen the ocean. Unlike her sister, Emma, Leah was perfectly content at home, baking pies and keeping house for Jonah and his family.
    “Dining in the formal dining room, are we?” called her husband, guiding his grandfather to the table. Jonah pulled off his hat and snaked a hand through his dark, nearly black hair. With his strong jaw and olive skin, he looked more like a biblical patriarch than an Amish dairy farmer, while Leah’s brown hair and eyes and rather rounded figure placed her smack in the middle of ordinary. “What’s for lunch,
fraa
, a standing rib roast with twice-baked potatoes? Chocolate mousse pie for dessert?” He swung his long legs under the table and reached for a cluster of grapes.
    Joanna swatted his hand. “Wait to say grace.” They bowed their heads for silent prayers before Joanna said to her son, “Sliced turkey with smoked cheddar sandwiches, pickled veggies, and fruit for dessert. And iced tea to drink. We have no champagne with strawberries or even ice cubes for your tea.”
    “Sounds perfect,” he said, focusing his gaze on Leah.
    She felt her cheeks grow warm while she passed the plate of sandwiches. Joanna filled plastic cups from the pitcher and set one in front of her father. When Amos reached for it with a shaky hand, his fingers knocked it over instead. “
Ach
,” he mumbled. “I caught a case of the clumsies today.”
    Joanna wiped up the liquid with the dishtowel she kept draped over her shoulder. “No harm done,
daed
, and there’s plenty more tea,” she said, exchanging a meaningful glance with her son. “It’s getting a bit warm today in the barn, no? I know the kitchen will be stuffy by the time Leah finishes baking.”
    Jonah turned toward his grandfather. “Why don’t you help
mamm
with whey separation in the dairy this afternoon,
grossdawdi
? It will be much cooler in there with the fans running.”
    Amos scoffed. “You still got the rest of the equipment to sterilize. I might as well clean and fill the water troughs and throw down some hay bales.” He took a bite of his